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Show MR. MACON WATCHDOG. (William E. Brlgham. in the Boston (Transcript.) "Be It enacted by Macon of Arkansas Arkan-sas and the senate of the United States." This Is the title for appropriation appro-priation bills facetiously suggested by a member of the house commlttco on appropriations after a particular trying try-ing day on the floor of the houso with ono of the great supply bills. A year or two ago Mr. Macon went out In search of the title "Watchdog of the treasury." it is hot at all certain cer-tain that Mr Macon was successful In his quest, but Its clear to every member mem-ber of the house of representatives that during the last two weeks lie has done more to disorganize the work of reform and retrenchment In the various va-rious departments of tho government than could possibly be done by the maintenance of tho red-tape system which has proved so irksome to such business men as Secretary of the Treasury MacVeagh and Secretary of the Navy Meyer. The reform in the treasury department depart-ment looked good to President Tatt, and to such a champion of economy as Chairman Tawney they looked to he the first great step toward putting the government on a business basis. The legislative, judicial and executive appropriation bill Incorporating these reforms of Secretary MacVeagh was reported to the house. There tho spirit of economy was confronted bv Representative Repre-sentative Macon of Arlcnnsas.'Mr. Macon Ma-con could not see a saving of 125,000 a year in the treasury department in the total appropriation for that department. depart-ment. His gaze was fixed upon an Increase In-crease of $200 or $300 for a clerk whose work was to be increased. This Increase was subject to a point of order, or-der, and Mr. Macon took advantage of his right to knock economy into a cocked hat and to substitute the antiquated anti-quated methods of a year ago by making mak-ing a point of order. In every paragraph para-graph of the bill, which was subject to a point bf order, Mr. Macon, posing as the champion of economy, compelled compell-ed Secretary MacVeagh to go back to the old system of duplication, ineffectiveness ineffec-tiveness and extravagance. It might be pertinent to ask what all of this objection avails Mr Macon Ma-con and what can be done by tho gov-ernment gov-ernment officials to prevent him from acting the part of dictator. In the first place it enables Mr. .Macon- to make a tabulation of the increases he strikes from appropriation bills, wich tabulation Is widely circulated In Mr Macon's district in. Arkansas for the ' purpose of showing his constituents 1 the many thousands of dollars he has snved tho United States government In the second place his stubbornness and short-sightedness make it necessary neces-sary for the senate appropriations committoo to go all over the work done by the house and restore to tho bill the Incroases asked for by tho govornment officials. Sometimes those Increasos are knocked out' In conference; confer-ence; sometimes thoy remain In th hill, always MK'Mncnn has obstructed plans for ecdnomy and made the committees com-mittees of congress do double work, just as bo attempts to mnko the department de-partment of the government do double work. nn |